Articles

Reporting the results of functional tests is relatively simple because these tests have a clear pass or fail outcome. Reporting the results of performance testing is much more nuanced, and there are many ways of displaying these values—but Michael Stahl felt none of these ways was particularly effective. He proposes a reporting method that makes performance test results easy to read at a glance.

Suppose we’re looking at a system rewrite where the stakeholders have none of the original engineering documentation. (This isn't surprising; documentation becomes obsolete—or even misleading—as the system changes, and corresponding docs don't get updated.) What can we do? Here are some tactics to use—and risks to anticipate—when testing a system rewrite.

Digital accessibility refers to assistive technologies as well as to accessibility of web and mobile applications and electronic documents. But there are crucial aspects to accessibility beyond syntactical correctness of the HTML code and supporting a range of browsers and devices. Software testers must have knowledge of accessibility patterns and use a variety of tools to understand the experiences of people with disabilities.

Equivalence partitioning and boundary value analysis are two specification-based techniques that are useful in black box testing. This article defines each of these techniques and describes, with examples, how you can use them together to create better test cases. You can save time and reduce the number of test cases required to effectively test inputs, outputs, and values.

Successful delivery of software requires the entire team, so it’s imperative that everyone choose their words carefully so they convey what they really mean, are sensitive to others’ feelings, and consider all aspects of a problem. Here are three questions to remember when communicating about your software testing projects to ensure you’re considering the power of words.

Of course getting training, practicing the skills of testing, moving into the right product line, and learning are all necessary for testers to grow their careers. But when Jon Hagar asked himself what helped him grow as a thinking tester, he came up with some ideas that are more off the beaten path. Consider these six tips and your future will be bright.

DevOps is more than adopting the right set of tools; it's a cultural shift that incorporates testing at each stage of the agile project lifecycle. Continuous testing is key to unlocking this culture change because it weaves testing activities into every part of the software design, development, and deployment processes, which helps everyone involved communicate more, collaborate better, and innovate faster.

The waterfall method of developing software is a bunch of translation activities: The design is a translation of the requirements into the language of architecture, the code is another, and a formal test process is a third. And with each translation, there’s the opportunity to introduce error. When your DevOps team is isolated, it creates another handoff, and another point of failure.

In just a year, one test team reduced its test cycle by more than 50 percent. It took analysis, planning, and effort—first they looked into how they spent their time, and then they questioned whether they could reduce time in any of those areas. Once they knew where they could be more efficient, they could start tackling their blockers. Here's how you can, too.

After ten years as a police officer, Adrian Oniga became a software tester. He was expecting a dramatic change, but he soon discovered that there are many similarities between testing and police work, including questioning, investigating, exploring, and analyzing. Here are some ways you can test like a law enforcement officer.